It has been reported that bacterial cellulose (BC) immersed in sucrose solution and lyophilized BC(BCS) significantly lowered plasma cholesterol concentration in rats, however, plant origin cellulose, with the same chemical properties as BCS, did not. We estimated that any differences in the physiological properties between BCS and plant origin cellulose were due to their physical properties. In this study, we altered the physical properties of diacetyl cellulose (DAC) derived from plant using six different treatments. DAC was treated by saponification (sDAC), after which sucrose was added to the sDAC preparation (sDAC-S). In another treatment, 10% DAC/acetone solution was added to the heated KOH/glycerol saponification solution and mixed. We then altered the physical properties of gDAC using different conditions including the effect of mixing speed: low speed (gDAC-L) and high speed (gDAC-H). In addition, sorbitol was added to the KOH/glycerol saponification solution to create gaps between the cellulose fibers, (gDAC-So). As the same treatment as gDAC-So, the 10% DAC/acetone solution was diluted two-fold to promote dispersion of the cellulose fiber (gDAC-5% ). The physical characteristics and similarities of the resulting six cellulose products to BCS were examined, based on the degree of deacetylation, settling volume in water, dye-binding capacity, adhesiveness and electron microscope photographs. The physical properties and similarities to BCS were lower for sDAC and sDAC-S when compared with gDAC-L, gDAC-H, gDAC-So and gDAC-5% . Thus, the preparations of sDAC and sDAC-S were concluded as unsuitable as the physical properties were not altered significantly. We compared the physical properties of gDAC-L, gDAC-H, gDAC-So and gDAC-5% , and observed that gDAC-5% had the highest settling volume in water, which is an important functionality of dietary fiber, making it the most similar to BCS. We have shown that the preparation method for gDAC-5 % was suitable for altering the physical properties of DAC.
Key words : bacterial cellulose sucrose (BCS), diacetyl cellulose (DAC), settling volume in water, plasma cholesterol. |
